Stock Portfolios V2

[MASShole]

Bit the bullet and bought some VZ today. I have a sneaky suspicion we won't keep up this bull market in 2015 (just a hunch) so I sold my VB shares and bought some VZ, and added to IBM and BP. I could have bought T or VZ, but since I'm a VZ customer for both cell and internet, I'll go with them. T's purchase of DirecTV may prove big for them soon. I also felt I need to add some diversity in terms of classes, as I'm heavy on energy and consumer staples, but had nothing in Telecom, Utilities or Materials. I don't want utilities right now, and don't see much in materials I care about. I almost pulled the trigger on 3M under Industrials - perhaps that will come next.

Since I started a Roth for my wife I'll be adding to VWO there, and when I get my 401k I'll be adding in small caps and int'l funds only.

 

[ElKarlo]

SeekingAlpha.com

Sometimes Fool.com but they like to throw in pitches for their products into their articles a lot, which is irritating.

I also use my TD Ameritrade account and read analyst research on companies I am interested in.

Same here. I like SA, the comments sections usually are pretty good. You write a crappy article there, and they eat you alive.

I like fool, but I too find their articles annoying at times. I don't like articles with an agenda. Their podcasts are better than their articles imho.

I think yahoo finance is best free site out there. Tons of links to articles.

 

[ElKarlo]

Top 2 that come to mind are JNJ and MCD. Usually once those are at $100 or so they split, as has been the case their last few times. I think MCD should split just to shake up some positive news after this dismal year.

Japan was great! Sushi galore.



Also: http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/upcoming-splits.aspx

That is what everyone says. JNJ is in it's traditional split range. I hope it comes sooner before later. I haven't had a stock split in a decade now IIRC.

Thanks for the link, I check it out from now and again, but haven't seen any major company on there.
Isuzu motors is going to split. It is an OTC stock so that is kinda funny.


Cool man, glad you liked it. You hit the conveyer belt sushi places? How were the beers/sodas here?

 

[ElKarlo]

Bit the bullet and bought some VZ today. I have a sneaky suspicion we won't keep up this bull market in 2015 (just a hunch) so I sold my VB shares and bought some VZ, and added to IBM and BP. I could have bought T or VZ, but since I'm a VZ customer for both cell and internet, I'll go with them. T's purchase of DirecTV may prove big for them soon. I also felt I need to add some diversity in terms of classes, as I'm heavy on energy and consumer staples, but had nothing in Telecom, Utilities or Materials. I don't want utilities right now, and don't see much in materials I care about. I almost pulled the trigger on 3M under Industrials - perhaps that will come next.

Since I started a Roth for my wife I'll be adding to VWO there, and when I get my 401k I'll be adding in small caps and int'l funds only.

Yeah, I got beat up yesterday. I think the bond market is going to start taking back it's share. Which will mean he market will trade more and more sideways. Which I am fine with. I am 32, so I plan on holding, and the DRIPS are better when the market doesn't move up.

I bought PSEC and MAIN on account of my feelings that the market will only go up a bit in the next year or two. I think 5% more for this year at most, and maybe that again for next. I want to see capex, so the econ will restart. Until then, I think QE has taken us as far as it possibly can.

 

[MASShole]

Cool man, glad you liked it. You hit the conveyer belt sushi places? How were the beers/sodas here?

All meals were arranged for us so we didn't really choose. I was totally fine with it because they chose meals whose apps were like this:

Next time I'll explore more. We didn't have any free time. Next time I'll try to go a day early or stay a day or two late and explore and hang with you, among other friends.

 

[MASShole]

Yeah, I got beat up yesterday. I think the bond market is going to start taking back it's share. Which will mean he market will trade more and more sideways. Which I am fine with. I am 32, so I plan on holding, and the DRIPS are better when the market doesn't move up.

I bought PSEC and MAIN on account of my feelings that the market will only go up a bit in the next year or two. I think 5% more for this year at most, and maybe that again for next. I want to see capex, so the econ will restart. Until then, I think QE has taken us as far as it possibly can.

I'm happy with DRIPs on sideways/declining movements. I won't make much of a change if a stock goes up wildly, because I don't want the headache of changing things. I'd rather just let it compound over time and not think about it all, and I could easily take the divs 2x/year and reinvest them as I see fit.

I do like Scottrade's flexDRIP or whatever it's called, where you can pool your divs and reinvest in up to 5 stocks of your choosing and change those stocks at any time. That's pretty cool. You could buy just one share of a stock and do the flexDRIP all year and get a full position (assuming you get enough divs), and then start over next year.

I'm staying away from BDCs for the time being. Perhaps I'll get into more CEFs in the future, but for now I'm in the phase of buying high quality stocks and letting them ride for the long term. If I look at my entire portfolio, I could comfortably condense it into about 8-10 stocks, and get rid of the remaining but I like the diversity and potential.

 

[ElKarlo]

Cool man, glad you liked Japan. The 24/7 tour thing is very Japanese. That is how they go on tours and what not. They don't like being given choices. Def make some time next time. Getting to hit up random things is the way to go.

I would love a DRIp bucket, but I dunno, I think just dripping to their respective stock is good enough. As I couldn't pick and choose.

I think BDCs are in for a wild ride, which is why they are getting hammered so badly. Which is 100% fine for me. I will take the high yield DRIP in the mean time.

I still don't fully understand closed ended funds to be able to invest in them. I need to sit down and really study them on the weekend or something.

I could go 8-10 stocks, but really I want about 40 in the end. To get my full diversity and good stocks. Otherwise I will miss out on some ones with some potential

 

[MASShole]

I still don't fully understand closed ended funds to be able to invest in them. I need to sit down and really study them on the weekend or something.

I could go 8-10 stocks, but really I want about 40 in the end. To get my full diversity and good stocks. Otherwise I will miss out on some ones with some potential

http://www.morningstar.com/solutions/Solutions.aspx?docid=370720

Good place to start with CEFs. They're not that hard to understand. IPO, no more offerings after, trades OTC and can use leverage. Lots of good CEFs out there for income giving you 7-10% regularly.


I now have 25 individual stocks - avg yield of 3.36%, div growth stands at 10.01%. I don't expect that to stay at 10 for 30 years, but rather regress to maybe 7 over the long run.

If the need ever arose, I could trim it to 8-10, but I'd rather have 40-50 with large investments in each. At that point I'd add utilities.

 

[ElKarlo]

Thanks for the link. I will check it out. I more or less understand them, but not 100% yet. I don't want to buy something that I don't fully understand. Then again, I do own Cisco.

Not a bad yield. I get 3.67% in my Roth, which Main, O, and PSEC help, while TTM, SBUX, CHD, and SSLT drag it down.

 

[Michaelangelo]

What a bipolar last few days the DOW has been

 

[MASShole]

Thanks for the link. I will check it out. I more or less understand them, but not 100% yet. I don't want to buy something that I don't fully understand. Then again, I do own Cisco.

Not a bad yield. I get 3.67% in my Roth, which Main, O, and PSEC help, while TTM, SBUX, CHD, and SSLT drag it down.

My traditional is 3.42% and my Roth is 3.15%. I have recently bought V, WSM, AAPL, and CHD which all have low yields, but are poised for a lot of div growth in the future. I'm pretty full on the standard energy and consumer staples.

I could always go higher with BDCs, more REITs (only own O and HCP), or some CEFs. However, I don't count BDCs and CEFs in my DGI portfolio, but rather those are really income sources more than anything else.

Traditional:
BP
PG
GE
PM
MCD
HCP
KMB
KO
CVX
KMI
ABBV
COP
V
IBM
WSM
VZ

Roth:
O
MSFT
XOM
GIS
AAPL
UL
JNJ
CHD
GSK

Each year I will transfer over 1-3 stocks from my Trad to my Roth and pay the taxes. Divs taxed as ordinary income are silly, IMO, so let's get those bad boys in a Roth! I'm very happy with the yield combined with the avg growth right now.

 

[MASShole]

What a bipolar last few days the DOW has been

Agreed. Even today I saw CVX down nearly 2% during the day, and it finished at -0.54%.

 

[MASShole]

What a bipolar last few days the DOW has been

Proven correct again today. Market went nuts.

 

[ElKarlo]

I like MLPs, which the one I hold, NMM has done very well for me.

I am going to keep about 10K in my trad brokerage, just in case, I need to cash out and need the money IRL. But anything outside of that, I am putting it in my ROTH.

How is your transferring from your IRA to your ROTH going?


The markets are having another sell off here. Wonder what the catalyst is? Only O in my port wasn't down

 

[Michaelangelo]

Proven correct again today. Market went nuts.

No rhyme or reason.

Down
Up
Down
Up
Up

 

[MASShole]

I like MLPs, which the one I hold, NMM has done very well for me.

I am going to keep about 10K in my trad brokerage, just in case, I need to cash out and need the money IRL. But anything outside of that, I am putting it in my ROTH.

How is your transferring from your IRA to your ROTH going?


The markets are having another sell off here. Wonder what the catalyst is? Only O in my port wasn't down

Only things that weren't down yesterday were O and HCP for me, my only REITs.

Transfer is easy. I have to take it slow otherwise I'll get a huge tax bill. I'm only doing $4k-$5k per year. I completed CHD and JNJ this year, and on 1/2 next year I'll choose 2 more stocks and transfer them to my Roth. I'll do this every year until I have no more stocks in my Traditional, only ETFs, and if I leave jobs whatever that brings over, which will slowly get converted to the Roth too.

If I had $10k I'd choose a decent monthly yielder that's not very volatile. It's better than sitting on cash and getting <1%.

 

[ElKarlo]

Only things that weren't down yesterday were O and HCP for me, my only REITs.

Transfer is easy. I have to take it slow otherwise I'll get a huge tax bill. I'm only doing $4k-$5k per year. I completed CHD and JNJ this year, and on 1/2 next year I'll choose 2 more stocks and transfer them to my Roth. I'll do this every year until I have no more stocks in my Traditional, only ETFs, and if I leave jobs whatever that brings over, which will slowly get converted to the Roth too.

If I had $10k I'd choose a decent monthly yielder that's not very volatile. It's better than sitting on cash and getting <1%.

Same. Also why are small caps getting crushed? The US gdp is up over 4%, and with more exposure to the US, small caps are the way to get that exposure. As everywhere else, there isn't much growth.

Ok, I need to get on that as well. I have 16k in my IRA. I need to get that out the sooner the better.

Sitting on cash nowdays is dumb, as=nd as you said just put in in a stock with the good beta.

As I am in Japan now, I am looking at Softbank, Hitachi and Mitsubishi heavy industries as good stocks to buy. Heavy industries such as Hitachi and Mitsubishi are having some serious growth. Seems heavy industries are in a secular super cycle.

 

[MASShole]

Many decent yield CEFs have low volatility and stay roughly the same price. As an example check out DHY's price range over the last year. Or even PFF.

You can do a Roth conversion for specific shares or entire positions, etc. You just have to send it to your brokerage and specify what you want to convert. It only takes a few days, so you could do it this year, and again in January for next year. You could get half of the conversion done in the next few months, and only owe taxes on $4k of income per year for the next 2 years.

As for small caps, they are getting way overvalued, in general. They do best coming out of a down turn, as they will lead the pack for growth. When there's a downturn and it seems to stay there, I'll be buying back into small caps.

 

[ElKarlo]

Many decent yield CEFs have low volatility and stay roughly the same price. As an example check out DHY's price range over the last year. Or even PFF.

You can do a Roth conversion for specific shares or entire positions, etc. You just have to send it to your brokerage and specify what you want to convert. It only takes a few days, so you could do it this year, and again in January for next year. You could get half of the conversion done in the next few months, and only owe taxes on $4k of income per year for the next 2 years.

As for small caps, they are getting way overvalued, in general. They do best coming out of a down turn, as they will lead the pack for growth. When there's a downturn and it seems to stay there, I'll be buying back into small caps.

Wow, DHY has a crazy high yield, without even having a high payout ratio like PSEC and other BDCs/REITS have. Looks interesting. Are the bonds in that fund junk bonds or what? Kinda curious here.

I maxed out my Roth this year, so I have to wait until next year to convert. I think it is worth the immediate tax hit. As I don't pay taxes later, which could save me a serious amount of money.

The small caps have had a long long rally, but if the US econ is really turning around, they are the place to be. Exposure to Europe and S America are hurting so many companies right now. That makes small caps the better bet imho. As their organic growth will be much higher imho.

Man I hate owning GE, even Cisco's stock price has basically caught up to it. The stock prices for both companies move like those rocks across death valley.
Came across one of these articles http://www.eweek.com/enterprise-app...ers-10-biggest-mistakes-as-microsoft-ceo.html

It is amazing how companies like MSFT, Cisco and IBM can make so many terrible acquisitions, and still are able to rake in billions despite being idiots so often. imgaine how much cash on hand microsoft would have if Ballmer didn't pull so many boners?

Edit, I didn't realize the Russel was trading at 49 earnings. That is pretty crazy high. I would not touch that either.

 

[Blood Python]

Same. Also why are small caps getting crushed? The US gdp is up over 4%, and with more exposure to the US, small caps are the way to get that exposure. As everywhere else, there isn't much growth.

Ok, I need to get on that as well. I have 16k in my IRA. I need to get that out the sooner the better.

Sitting on cash nowdays is dumb, as=nd as you said just put in in a stock with the good beta.

As I am in Japan now, I am looking at Softbank, Hitachi and Mitsubishi heavy industries as good stocks to buy. Heavy industries such as Hitachi and Mitsubishi are having some serious growth. Seems heavy industries are in a secular super cycle.

Did you hear softbank is trying to acquire dreamworks? I hope it will be positive bc I convinced my dad to invest in softbank.